Back home, finally. We flew out of Dallas this morning, made it to Portland, caught the shuttle to get Stef’s car, then over to Mark’s to pick up mine and drove the 3 hrs. down to Roseburg.
Toby is beside himself with doggie glee. He hasn’t seen me in 3 weeks and, any time we walk out to the mailbox, he thinks we will be gone forever, so it’s a big deal for me to come walking in the door.
Glad to be back. The KZEW REUNION in Dallas was so wonderful. Really glad we went. JS
Big weekend, this one. Our KZEW 2015 REUNION was so much fun! I was delighted to see so many old friends from radio days, just as I was delighted to have participated, way back in the 1970’s, in a Dallas/Ft.Worth station that rocked FM radio out of the elevator and into the ears and hearts of so many listeners for so long.
I left the ZOO in 1979 to go off to the Rolf Institute in Boulder to learn how to become a Rolfer.
A lot can happen to our butts, bellies and hair in 36 years, most of it not so good. What doesn’t seem to change, though, is the love we felt for each other while working at that radio station. It was there way back then and, I’m happy to report, I still feel it now. I’m catching a plane this morning and heading back to Oregon with such wonderful memories scatter-gunning themselves around in my heart. What a great weekend. Wow. JS
Yesterday, three years ago, a head injury sent my life skittering sideways. Unless you have had a brain injury, it is impossible to know how awful it can be. My compassion for people who have wrestled with that type of injury has increased a thousand-fold. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, not even people I don’t like.
Well, maybe one or two. Sometimes, my heart is dark. JS
I just said something my mother used to say – what a shock. Kay was heading out the door and said, “I’ll be back,” to which I replied (just like my mother, Jo Seay, used to say,) “You can’t scare us with your threats.”
I like it when Mother shows up, cleverly disguised as me. JS
Dogwood trees were a glorious idea, their pink and white flowers like delicate, fluttery eyelashes of color winking at me as I walk along the neighborhood streets in Tulsa. Wow.
Azaleas, too, mostly in the loveliest reddish-fuscia color; they poof out from every cluster of shrubbery – so beautiful.
Spring is on the loose here in Tulsa, Oklahoma! Feeling grateful this morning that I have eyes with which to see how pretty it all is. I hope all of you enjoy your day, too. JS
These American assholes killed this mother rhino, which is why this traumatized baby rhino needs snuggles.
How can people do this? How can they think this is “sport”?
This makes me sick. If you are a “hunter” and you don’t eat what you kill, that’s not hunting – it’s slaughter – and you’re a jackass. JS
Many thanks and hugs to my friends Bonnie Cottle and Cindy Roden for their hospitality and kindnesses during the two days I had to spend in Ft. Worth this past week. Getting to spend time around good Texas women, enjoying laughter and conversation – even with a cat sitting on top of my head – eating food I love (but shouldn’t have so much of, really) was a joy, something only other Texas women can understand. Time to thaw out the salmon when I get back to Oregon, for sure, to clean my arteries out again. Still, I say, Thank you, ladies! And, thanks for keeping the reputation of good Texas women alive and well in my home state. JS
Easter celebrations, when I was a kid, always included (after church, of course) a picnic lunch with my mother’s side of the family, usually at Samuell’s Park, in Dallas, although sometimes we opted for Kiest Park.
A baked ham was accompanied by deviled eggs, baked beans, potato salad and coleslaw, sometimes even Aunt Edna’s world-famous pea salad, if we begged sweetly enough and badgered her into submission. How everyone managed to get all that food into their cars with all those kids, too, is mind-boggling.
And, that wasn’t all! Of course, we had to bring a football, baseball gloves, bats, balls, and even the stuff to build kites, hide Easter eggs and the croquet set – plus!
Who could forget dessert?
Certainly not my tribe, so Mama Loyes always made her very special, diabetic-coma-inducing triple layer German Chocolate Cake, which weighed about 40 lbs., but was so huge even our clan couldn’t gobble it all up in one afternoon. One year, Mama Loyes forgot to bring coffee cups (since she always had coffee in that plaid thermos of hers, but had lost the lid/cup years before,) so my mother fashioned coffee cups out of aluminum foil just for that day so the grown-ups could enjoy some coffee with their slab of cake. It’s a nice memory for me.
I hope all of you are busy on this day of gathering and spiritual celebration making memories with the people you love. It’s one of the reasons we are here, I think, trundling along together, creating some sweet memories which make us look back on our lives with a smile. JS
I have no hair on my legs. None. Menopause had rendered me down to 3 on my right leg only and zero on the left and now those 3 have disappeared, too. I’m thinking I must have dripped some of my home-made weed killer onto my pants leg the other day. Or, perhaps my eyesight is going. Or, aliens made off with me in the night, plucked out those 3 remaining hairs for research, looked at each other and said, “Nah, she’s a geezer – she’ll never even notice,” then carted me back home and into my bed before dawn when I awoke. At any rate, that’s the status for today.
Spooky, isn’t it? The thought that you could be double-crossed by your very own body 3 & 4 times in one lifetime is really kind of creepy, don’t you think? I mean, just when I finally get used to it being a particular way – WHAM! – there’s something new that’s arrived or disappeared and, suddenly, I have to spend twice as long to look half as good as I ever did, and even half of that time is spent plucking or tweeking somehow, or clipping or tucking in or cinching up or buffing or smearing with some sort of cream or ointment.
So, I hope you’re having a hey-day, you creepy, weird-O aliens, with my 3 leg hairs, and I hope my schizophrenic DNA sprays all over you when you crack those babies open. You won’t know what’s hit you. I certainly don’t. That’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it. JS
